OSHA prescribes a number of safety measures which must be taken to protect workers while a building is under construction, and these may also serve to protect other persons, such as an owner or prospective purchaser who wishes to see the building while under construction. Among these are requirements for temporary guard railing to be erected along the edges of floor surfaces where there is no wall or other restraint, and from which there is a sufficient vertical drop to present a serious hazard should a person fall from the edge of the floor surface.
As used herein, "floor surface" will be loosely construed to include virtually any generally horizontal surface such as a floor, a balcony, a step of a stairway, or a landing of a stairway. Such a floor surface will be considered "open" if there is no wall, permanent guard railing, or other restraint along its edge. It should be understood that such open floor edges can occur along the outer periphery of, for example, a floor or balcony, and can also occur inwardly from the edge, e.g., if the floor has an opening for receipt of a skylight, attic hatch, or the like.
Undesirable amounts of time and materials may be used where the temporary guard railing is constructed in a conventional manner from wood mounted to the building under construction in a conventional manner. Additional time is spent in removing the temporary guard railing when it is no longer needed, and even if some of the materials from that temporary railing can be re-used, it is usually necessary to disassemble that material and reconstruct a guard rail from scratch when it is re-used. Additionally, the low guard rail or toe board often required near the floor surface can make it difficult and still more time consuming to move materials such as pieces of sheetrock into the area protected by the guard railing.